With four candidates remaining, many are wondering about the likelihood of a brokered convention where no candidate wins in the first round. Conventional wisdom suggests there will not be a brokered convention.

From where I sit, one is increasingly likely. Following is a table of delegates won so far (totals from Real Clear Politics Delegate Count), plus my projections of all primaries and caucuses through Super-Tuesday on March 6 (based on recent polls).

Voters will go to locations for their county and use ballots or tokens to support a candidate on Tuesday, March 6th. There are five candidates for Idaho voters to choose from and they will keep voting until a winner is selected.

In each round the candidate with the fewest votes or anyone with less than 15% is out of the race. The voting ends at the county level when there is a final vote for two candidates or one has more than 50% of the vote for that county.

The delegates assigned for that county will then represent the winning candidate. Counties will report their winner to the state office in Boise. If one candidate has more than 50% of the vote for all of Idaho, they get all 32 delegates. Otherwise, the candidates split delegates they won in each county

I cannot find any recent polls for North Dakota, Alaska, or Vermont. Romney should do extremely well in Vermont and fair at best in North Dakota and Alaska.North Dakota Prediction 28 Delegates Percent: Romney-35% Santorum-40% Gingrich-10% Paul-10% Delegates: Romney-10 Santorum-12 Gingrich-3 Paul-3 Alaska Prediction 27 Delegates Percent: Romney-35% Santorum-40% Gingrich-10% Paul-10% Delegates: Romney-10 Santorum-11 Gingrich-3 Paul-3 Vermont Prediction 17 Delegates Percent: Romney-64% Santorum-16% Gingrich-6% Paul-8% Delegates: Romney-11 Santorum-4 Gingrich-1 Paul-1 How Ron Paul Can Throw a Big Wrench Into Romney's Campaign I purposely bumped up Romney's percentages to see if a brokered convention would still be possible. I also awarded Romney all 32 delegates in Idaho even though that race is a statistical dead-heat with Ron Paul. If Ron Paul wins Idaho, and the rest of my numbers above are close, the odds of a brokered convention are well above 50 percent in my estimation. There may be a brokered convention anyway, provided Santorum, Paul, and Gingrich stay in to the end.Fuzzy Math The New York Times discusses The G.O.P.'s Fuzzy Delegate Math.

There are 2,286 delegates to the Republican National Convention, of which 1,144 are required to clinch a majority. The Web site TheGreenPapers.com, which has extensive information on delegate-selection procedures in each state, divides them into two broad categories, what it calls "hard" and "soft." Hard delegates are formally bound to a candidate on at least the first ballot at the convention, while soft delegates are not.

Although this is a useful conceptual framework, it probably simplifies things too much. Instead, Republican delegates exist along something of a spectrum between bound and unbound, pledged and unpledged, hard and soft.

Contributing to the confusion is that there are a series of three interrelated ideas about delegates which are often treated as interchangeable, even though they are not:

Bound vs. Unbound Delegates. Is the delegate officially bound to a particular candidate on at least the first ballot at the convention?

Pledged vs. Unpledged Delegates. Whether or not she is formally bound to a candidate, will the delegate's candidate preference be known in advance of the convention and reported upon by the news media?

Elected vs. Selected Delegates. Was the delegate selected through some relatively direct means, such as based on the popular vote in the state's primary? Or through some indirect means, like through the series of conventions that often take place in caucus states, and which may not correspond to the popular vote there?

Category of Delegates

Legal Challenges on the Way I did not take any of the bound, unbound, super-delegate counts into consideration. However, I was rather generous to Romney in other ways. Moreover, there are legal challenges pending in Arizona and Florida. Winner-Take-All primaries are a violation of Republican National Committee rules if held before April 1. As it stands, Romney has 50 Florida delegates and 29 Arizona delegates that could dramatically change totals. Should Romney loses those challenges and also lose Idaho, a brokered convention would be all but certain.If Wishes Were Fishes If wishes (mine) were fishes, then Ron Paul would win the nomination outright. A more realistic wish is for a brokered convention because Romney, Santorum, and Gingrich are all likely to lose to Obama. I believe Paul would defeat Obama although polls don't currently support that idea.Republicans Need to Face the Facts Of the four candidates, only Ron Paul balances the budget, only Ron Paul wants to stop the war-mongering, only Ron Paul does not alienate the majority of women, only Ron Paul can ignite a fire in independents, and independents (not the radical right), are the key to this election. Republicans are not going to vote for Obama so appealing to the far right makes little sense in terms of an overall strategy. Moreover, independents are likely horrified by the war-mongering and misguided statements on religious and social issues of all the candidates but Paul. If Republicans lose this election, it will be because they all outdid each other in foolish attempts to appeal to the far right on issues where a huge majority of the population of the US is in the middle.